Re: Accidentals: Unwanted naturals

[Reinhold Kainhofer]

Am Montag, 31. August 2009 06:14:21 schrieb David Raleigh Arnold:
> On Saturday 29 August 2009, Kieren MacMillan wrote:
> > David,
> >
> > > The key signature is and has been for many centuries
> > > an integral part of the notation.
> >
> > Yes... and now you're suggesting we make it *not* integral — your
> > argument holds no merit.
>
> No. I'm stating outright that you make the key signature
> musically irrrelevant now, because changing the key signature has no
> effect on the pitch of the notes.

No, it's not making it irrelevant. But you are right, the key signature has no 
effect on the pitch with absolute note neames, because in lilypond you need to 
give the absolute pitch (i.e. the note name). Per definition a pitch is a 
pitch, and the key signature does not change the pitch, it only changes how a 
pitch is displayed (i.e. the key signature is a shortcut that avoids writing 
lots of accidentals) and it describes the basic harmony that lies behind the 
notes.

Your argument makes sense if you think in relative solmisation (as developed 
byCurwen and Kodaly, see e.g. Wikipedia: 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonic_sol-fa ), where the note names don't 
specify absolute pitches like c,d,e,f,g,a,b,c, but relative pitches within the 
key signatures. 

E.g. a "do" in tonic solmisation always describes the tonic of the key, "re" 
always the note above, etc. Their meaning changes with the key signature, of 
course. This seems to be quite popular in the States, while over here in 
Europe, practically everyone uses and thinks in absolute pitch names.
(There is also absolute solmisation, where a do is always the absolute pitch 
c, so that is basically just absolute pitch names named do, re, mi, etc.)

However, the absolute pitch names a, b, etc. are really absolute pitch names 
and their meaning should never, ever depend on the key signature. Just ask 
anyone music teacher of any level you know...
What you are asking for, is basically an implementation of tonic solmisation 
in lilypond, where you want to misuse absolute pitch names.

However, beware that tonic solmisation is not a general solution. It works for 
tonal pieces, but modern pieces often don't have an underlying tonality, so 
there is no key signature to which the names can be proportional.


> Try to be more rational, please.

Try to be less insulting, please.

And please try to accept that there are other people, who have far better 
musical education than you have. There are lots of people involved in lilypond 
who really know what they are doing...

Cheers,
Reinhold

-- 
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Reinhold Kainhofer, address@hidden, http://reinhold.kainhofer.com/
 * Financial & Actuarial Math., Vienna Univ. of Technology, Austria
 * http://www.fam.tuwien.ac.at/, DVR: 0005886
 * LilyPond, Music typesetting, http://www.lilypond.org